Unbelievable Paper Spam

Not all spam is electronic. Some comes in professional looking printed form. My mate Dave just received a real doozy, from the 'International Biographical Centre'. He was told that he was being reocgnised as an 'Icon' in the field of philosophy, and had the 'International Socrates Award for Philosophical Achievement' bestowed upon him by IBC.

Jolly serious sounding stuff.

Except that to formally complete the bestowment, you need to cough up for the certificate. And that costs ... wait for it ... USD635! So it must be a very, very nice certificate indeed. Or (much more likely) the IBC are in business because enough sad little people out there are prepared to pay for an ego boost. As long as that remains the case, it's worth the Ibc sending these letters out to anyone who crosses their radar.

So Dave wrote in to ask for an explanation:

Hello IBC,

I recently received [...] a letter advising me that I had an 'International Socrates Award for Philosophical Achievement' bestowed upon me by IBC.

Could you please tell me a little more about how decisions to bestow the award are made? (Do you have a panel of reviewers? Which specific parts of my work were considered?)

Also, I'd appreciate it if you could let me know the names of other recent recipients, so I know just what kind of league I'm now playing in.

Thanks and Regards,

D[...]

Let's see what they have to say for themselves. After that, we can try to find out what they can say to justify the spectacular cost of the certificate. They do say that it is 'laminated', but that hardly warrants the price of over 600 Dollars.

For a bit more on the IBC, take a look on Wikipedia, and on this blog post, and this one.